Silver-tongued salesmen still garner crowds in the PNE Marketplace

Summer fun at the PNE in Vancouver, BC Tuesday, August 21, 2012. Pictured is Paul (left) and Gord Rundle, who show how to slice a tomatoe with a razor-sharp knife they sharpened with their Kleva Sharp knife sharpener, available at the Marketplace.

Photograph by: Jason Payne
, VANCOUVER SUN

The Internet may offer a quick and convenient — if impersonal — way to shop, but the energetic pitchmen at the Pacific National Exhibition’s Marketplace will tell you nothing beats trying before buying.

This year, more than 200 vendors have purchased booths in the cavernous Forum building, nestled inconspicuously in the southwest corner of the fairgrounds.

They hawk everything from sculptures cut from Zimbabwean stone, to bladeless fans, invisible bras and computerized analyses of your gait. The biggest crowds seem to gather around sellers like 68-year-old Gordon Edward Rundle.

The burly salesman bellows at passersby from atop his mock-kitchen stage, where he demonstrates the superiority of the tiny Kleva knife sharpeners he sells.

The Toronto native first started pitching T-Fal cookware at the PNE 39 years ago for his older brother, Ron Rundle, the now-deceased silver-tongued salesman who was the main subject of the 1985 documentary Pitchmen.

Over the years the surviving Rundle has made money from Ginsu knives, magic pens and sticky rollers. “You name it we’ve pretty much gone through it,” he says.

“There’s no books that teach you how to do this and the people that taught me used to sell stuff years ago that didn’t work,” Rundle continues. “They were truly characters back when my brother was alive.”

In the past, pitchmen would use tricks to dupe consumers into buying less-than-useful gadgets, but Rundle stands by his knife sharpener, specialized hose nozzle and ratcheted garden loppers and offers lifetime warranties for all three. And of course, minus those pesky shipping and handling costs, he claims his PNE prices are a serious bargain.

“We service what we sell, we got a better return policy than Walmart,” Rundle says as he sits down to handle the cash while his son, Paul, mans the demonstration booth. “At least we’re still in business, Eaton’s and Woodward’s are broke!”

Rundle rented three booths this year, one for each product he pushes through his company, GR Distributors Inc. He’s downsized from a decade ago, when he used to rent about 10, because he was sick of the workplace drama inherent in managing so many people. But he’s still addicted to “the excitement of when it’s really busy” and gets “hyped up by the money;” so he travels the country with his son Paul and another salesman, Dave Archambault year-round. They do the exhibition circuit in the summer, Christmas fairs in the winter and home, garden and boat shows the rest of the year.

Across the aisle, Archambault, a self-professed PNE legend, shows a crowd of arthritic greenthumbs how his ratcheted pruners and loppers can improve their gardening. Archambault, 58, grew up in Winnipeg and began working in fairs when he was 16 years old, about the same time he got the rose tattoo on his forearm with the word ‘MOM’ inked across it.

He’s been on the road ever since, selling various products across Canada, but has been moving the pruners for Rundle the past 20 years.

“It’s a whole different way of life,” he says with a wink. “You put in a lot of hours and if you’re married and you’re both not in the business, it’s very hard.”

Luckily for Archambault, his wife Sonia is across the building giving massages — for a fee. She comes to many of the roughly 30 fairs her husband visits across Canada each year. Two of their children are now pitching and the Archambaults’ young grandchildren can often be found on the fairgrounds, making theirs a three-generation carnival family.

The sellers are loathe to divulge any of their techniques, but Rundle, who visits Hong Kong every couple years to check out new gadgets, says when he begins pitching a new product, like this year’s knife sharpener, he doesn’t have a set script. Over time, certain phrases stick and he eventually irons out a consistent pitch.

Lori McCaughey certainly has her pitch perfected for the garment steamer that removes wrinkles from clothes, even if she has lost her voice after just three days of the fair.

“Slide and glide baby,” she whispers as she passes the steamer over a wrinkled silk blouse.

And even a “legend” like Archambault cannot pitch away each 12-hour day. The sellers spell eachother off every few hours. Despite the monumental energy required as the 17-day PNE peaks in the feverish final days, Rundle says it provides his family with a “fabulous lifestyle.”

He’s reluctant to discuss just how good his margins are, but back in 1990 he told The Sun that a stall at the PNE “is like a blue-chip stock” for vendors.

“This is a good location and I feel honoured to be able to carry out a tradition,” he said back then. “A fair without pitch booths is like a fair without candy floss.”

Story Tools

Summer fun at the PNE in Vancouver, BC Tuesday, August 21, 2012. Pictured is Paul (left) and Gord Rundle, who show how to slice a tomatoe with a razor-sharp knife they sharpened with their Kleva Sharp knife sharpener, available at the Marketplace.

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